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dealing with "boys" on a power trip, we're dealing with a whole system determined to take what it wants.
"DID YOU EVER FEEL LIKE YOU WERE INVISffiLE?" Women are to a large extent the heart/soul/head and of course the typists/ mailers/ etc. of mixed political organizations. And yet we sometimes feel that we are in a time warp-that the women's movement never happened or was just a nice dream. At meetings and demonstrations, men are pontificating, dominating and competing, leaving most women (all but the exceptional few) feeling alienated and left out. In one Berkeley left conference, a man coordinated the workshop on women. The left organizations that don't condemn lesbians and gay men as products of bourgeois decadence for the路most part end up ignoring them. We hear arguments that women's actions are divisive and take away from the "real deal." There are male activists who go in and out of personal relationships with first this woman and then that, who divide us one from the other. Personal relationships are once again seen as a private domain, leaving women to struggle against male supremacy alone. We don't think men are the enemy, yet they do bold women and the movement back. We need to make men accountable for their actions and the way they operateto light a volcano under the male-dominated left. Faced with male chauvinist and arrogant leadership, the response of "feminist process" is to say since all leadership is oppressive our solution should be to get rid of it altogether. We end up throwing out the baby with the bath water. Either leadership j ust develops informally (and then it for sure is male-dominated) or we end up ineffective, incapable of decisive action and of resolving issues. We need to learn how to build collective leadership that is accountable and is conscious of developing new people and new skills. Political power is not just a "male ego trip." How we use power, how we build organization, is what will determine how effective we are and whether we will move forward. To really transform society, more developed levels of revolutionary organization and leadership are necessary. Women's organization, caucuses and leadership must be integral to this process. Revolutions and revolutionary societies are made up of both women and men. We are not separatists. We believe that men can and do change. Yet, from our experience in
this country, we believe that the only way for men to change is if there is an active women's movement fighting for women's liberation. The development of. anti-imperialist women's organizations has been and will be a material force that will push the struggle forward the way no amount of articles or discussions can.
THE CHIWREN ARE THE FUTURE We want a different kind of world and we're willing to fight for it. We, like other mothers, want something different for our children. We want a women's movement that takes on collective responsibility for raising our children, both to insure that they'll have different values and because we know we can't organize if we don't help each other with our kids. We want a movement that helps lesbians have kids and defends them when they're threatened with losing their children. We want our daughters to be proud and confident of themselves and our sons to understand that they can grow up gentle and caring, that they don't have to be macho boys. All our children should be able to determine their own sexual identities and to live free of oppressive sex roles. We want o ur children to develop respect for other peoples and a hatred of white supremacy. Our children don't have to fight for their very survival as do nine-year-olds in El Salvador or Azania. Yet how will we insure that they will want to fight for freedom in their own Lives? As for ourselves, we want a different quality of life as well. Yet this can't happen in a world at the mercy of U.S. imperialism. Our own difficulties, our Lack of confidence, our problems in sometimes getting along and remaining committed can be challenged within a political context. It will take some time and we'll make millions of mistakes. The anti-imperialist women's movement didn't disappear. It's right here in our minds and in our hearts. Let's put our futures with those of women, men and children around the world. Let's demand the most from ourselves and our movement. If we do that we can fight for liberation, for a socialist world, fight for an end to imperialism itself. We want revolutionary feminism. We know we can't have revolution without full women's participation. Let's build a movement that will insure that both will come true.